Mountain
Gorilla Updates, 2000

I recently received a
letter written by Sebastien
Honorethat provides a
synopsis of the current state of affairs for the Mountain
Gorilla and he has graciously given his permission for me
to post it on this website.

CONGO's GORILLAS
MARKED FOR EXTINCTION BECAUSE OF POLITICS.

Unfortunately this is another doom and gloom story.
However you can help. You can make a difference; you can
help save the gorillas.Congo's Kahuzi-Biega National Park
is located in the highlands overlooking Lake Kivu. It is
prime mountain rainforest and the home of 280 gorillas.
This is one of the last remaining gorilla sanctuaries in
the world. Further it abounds with other wildlife
including forest elephants. Truly it deserves its World
Heritage listing!

Miraculously the park survived Congos'
political upheavals and wars, that is until three years
ago when Rwanda invaded this part of the Congo. Now the
Rwanda-backed government has disarmed the park rangers
and left the poachers free to slaughter the gorillas in
the park. Let's not mince on words: with unarmed park
rangers the poaching is wholesale and totally simply out
of control. Without your help the park and the gorillas
are doomed.

This is January 2000, the dawn of the new
millennium. Mankind rejoices because it has now the
scientific, technological basis and the human and humane
wisdom necessary to plan a bright future for the planet.
Yet on the dawn on the new millennium, precisely on
January 1, 2000, the remnants of three gorillas
slaughtered by poachers were found in the Kahuzi-Biega
National Park. In January 2000 there remain in the Park
at most 99 gorillas, three years ago there were 280
gorillas. In plain words, 65% of the gorillas have been
slaughtered. Only one gorilla out of 3 has survived
Rwanda's military invasion of Congo three years ago.

The slaughter of gorillas continues today
as you read this news. Other wildlife has also suffered
even worse. There remain at best 20 elephants, at worst 5
elephants. Three years ago there were at least 320
elephants. That is a 95% extinction rate. It started
three years ago when elephant meat from animals killed in
the park started to be shipped to Rwanda to feed the
Rwanda army. The park rangers are very keen and
motivated. However the Rwanda-backed government has
disarmed them (this area of Congo has been paired with
the small Butare province of Rwanda). The park rangers do
patrol the park, but they are unarmed. They are facing
poachers who have automatic weapons, including
Kalachnikov. It is no contest, the poachers' bullets
versus the body of park rangers! The gorillas lose
everytime and every day and pay with their life. The park
rangers are attacked and killed by the poachers and
without weapons they cannot defend themselves. The
rangers can't even sleep in the park anymore, they come
early morning in the park and count more slaughtered
gorillas weekly. All the park rangers can do is stay with
the two habituated families in daytime and hope for the
best. However when the armed poachers come in, the
unarmed park rangers have to flee. The park rangers are
no cowards, indeed until they were disarmed by
Rwanda-backed government they were patrolling the park
efficiently, they had no fear to track and stop the armed
poachers, there was virtually no poaching.

I met Mugaruka, the young silverback.
Recently, after Rwanda disarmed the park rangers, this
200-kg gorilla lost a hand. He tore it from a steel trap
set by poachers. Can you imagine the pain, the anguish,
the suffering? I saw all this in his eyes. Yet his eyes
expressed the fear and knowledge he is condemned to death
in a most cruel manner. So much for man's enlightenment
in the new Millennium!

What is the reason? It is not money. It
is not starvation. It is not an accident. It is human
greed and geopolitics. The Kahuzi-Biega is a repeat of
the situation in Rwanda's 6000 km2 Akagera National Park.
To avoid the Western World outrage if the park was
degazetted outright, the Akagera National Park was
destroyed one step at a time by the Rwanda government
over the last 4 years. First the rangers were disarmed
and poachers run free; then the army slaughtered the
dangerous animals such as lions; then cattlemen with the
correct political connection were allowed in; then the
charcoal burners were allowed in to deforest the area;
and step by step the land was unofficially but
efficiently opened for settlers with the correct
political connections. Finally when fauna and flora were
all gone and the park was de facto not a park anymore,
the bulk (75%) of the park was degazetted. Government
ministers became rich landlords in the process.

Unfortunately this scenario seems to be
repeated in Congo's Kahuzi-Biega National Park. The same
Rwanda government is effectively in control. The policy
clearly seems to be to let the poachers eradicate
gorillas in order for Rwanda officials to seize the land
once the park loses its value after the gorillas are
gone. In Rwanda none of the large conservation groups and
societies uttered a word of protest to the press or to
the Rwanda government when the Akagera National park was
destroyed. They were afraid to be accused to be
insensitive to the human tragedy. Certainly people have
suffered untold miseries in the ethnic cleansing in
Rwanda. Nevertheless that does not excuse a deliberate
policy of bringing gorillas to extinction.

There is a precedent for that. In World
War II in Poland the last European wild buffaloes were
preserved by all sides at war (the Nazis, the communists
and the Polish underground) in the middle of untold human
misery, a war, mass murders and mass starvation, because
the people believed that when peace will return these
wild animals were an important heritage of their country
and had to be preserved. This demonstrates that human
misery does not excuse bringing rare animals to
extinction.

There is no reason to repeat with the
gorillas of Kahuzi-Biega National Park the mistake of the
Akagera National Park, namely to stay silent. The
situation in Kahuzi-Biega is, plain and simply, barbaric
- just look into the suffering eyes of Mugaruka and you
will understand that we, people, owe it to humanity to
save the gorillas of the Kahuzi-Biega National Park
before Rwanda destroys this park and its gorillas.

Money is not the issue here. Please do
not send money! Instead, please write your concern to the
press. Mainly and most importantly for the people from
the USA, Japan and EEC reading this, please write to your
representative in parliament and request that your
democratic government stops all financial aid to Rwanda
until it abandons its policy of leading gorillas to
extinction. Rwanda is totally dependent on foreign aid,
your message will bite, will count and will help save the
gorillas of Kahuzi-Biega. It is your taxpayer money that
is now helping Rwanda bring gorillas to extinction. You
have control on that money. Only you can save the
gorillas. Only you writing to your government
representative to stop financial assistance to Rwanda
until Rwanda stops promoting the slaughter of gorillas,
will stop the deliberate extinction of gorillas.

PLEASE WRITE TO
YOUR GOVERNMENT.

Sebastien
Honore

If you have additional information that
you would like to post on this website about the Mountain
Gorillas, please email me.